Your know YOUR RIGHT

[Chromatix]

I managed to make a 25km bicycle journey - that's 15 miles - a few days ago, in the countryside (so no grid system), using a printed-out paper map (which I had to keep tucked into the pannier rack behind me)... without making any wrong turns.

You may now be insanely jealous.

I had also done the sensible thing and taken the train to the nearest station to the destination. Everyone else cycling to this place was starting from the office and doing a 40km ride. We started from the office at the same time, and I arrived at least 45 minutes earlier.

Now they're all looking at me as though I'm crazy, because I opted to cycle the 25km back to the station that evening, instead of just loading my bike into the bus.

[BookstoreEscapee]

I can do the Vulcan salute with both hands...but sometimes I kinda have to think about it on the left for a second...

[XCashier]

I would say partly individual, and partly regional.

If, for example, you are from a city that is built on a grid system, where everything is north, south, east, or west, such as Phoenix or Tucson (check out maps for these cities, you'll see what I am talking about), the whole NSEW things is far easier than if you are from some place that just has a lot of windy roads going in a lot of different directions.

That's a very good point. I am originally from Phoenix, learned to drive there, and I will say this for Phoenix: addresses are amazingly easy to find there.

I'm now living in a town with a lot of crazy winding roads. I'm still prefer NSEW directions to left/right, because I can be reasonably sure I'm headed the correct way. With left/right directions, one wrong move and I'm SOL.

[r2cagle]

I got lost on my way to this thread...

[Jester]

Before I say anything else, I have to say the caller from the original post is a complete and total idiot. End of story. That being said....

How do I break this to her in the most polite way possible without making her feel stupid and embarrassed for confusing her right from her left.

The way I often do it is simple. "No, your OTHER right!" And most people get that. Yes, you are correcting them, yes, you are pointing out that they are confusing their left and their right, but most people get that this is sometimes common, and saying it this way does save a lot of time from trying not to offend people by pretending you don't know that they have just confused their left and their right.

If it makes you feel any better, my girlfriend has trouble telling her left from her right.

I've now taken to saying "see that *insert car going the same direction as us* up ahead? Follow him"

My best friend Neets is notoriously dyslexic, so after years of driving with her, I no longer say "go left" or "go right." Now I say "go your way" or "go my way." It makes more sense to her, she can't possibly confuse where each of us is in the car, and her brain doesn't get bogged down trying to figure out which way I mean. And since she knows she is dyslexic, knows that I know she is dyslexic, and knows how much trouble we have had in the past, this does not bother her in any way. It's much easier for all concerned. Hell, I think that even her husband has started to do that with her the few times she's driving when they are both in the car.

Now, how about reading those damn analogue clocks?

You would have hated growing up in my parents' house. They had (and still have) not one, but TWO clocks with no numbers on them. One just has a black face with a white spot where the twelve would be, and the other one has twelve circles in the appropriate areas, but no numbers.

Trust me when I tell you that my parents' three children have no problem with any analog clocks, with or without numbers!

You haven't reached the zenith of stupidity until you've got someone who spends the entire call typing the letter 'O' in their password instead of zero, because they think you mean alphabetical zeroes instead of numerical zeroes.

First of all,

Second of all, I would beg to differ, as I am pretty sure I have seen the zenith of stupidity, between the guy that asked me how to get to the upstairs section of the restaurant when he was standing there in front of the stairs, looking at the upstairs section and the stairs leading up to them, and more recently, the guy who asked me quite seriously if Mount Gay Rum was rum designed for gay people to drink.

When people tell me that there are no stupid questions, I disagree, and use the above two, and others, as proof that there really are.

"What kind of fish can we catch under the island?"

I rest my case.

It's like doing the Vulcan salute. Did you know that only about 50% of people can do that? It's not a special skill or anything. It's just something you have a fifty-fifty chance of being able to do.

And I could never do it....until reading your post, with my right hand on the mouse, I absentmindedly did it with my left hand. Without any problem. I can somewhat do it with my right hand, but barely, and then I can't hold it. No such issues with my left. Very, very odd. (Full disclosure: I have broken the middle finger of my right hand and my left wrist, but I have no idea if either of those play into this.)

But I can only do the Vulcan salute with my left hand.

I am not alone! And that gives the whole "you have a 50% chance of being able to do that" a whole new spin, as Exaspera and I can only do it with 50% of our hands!

Um, I'm female too, and I've never had a problem with NSEW. I think it's an individual thing, not a gender thing.

I would say partly individual, and partly regional.

If, for example, you are from a city that is built on a grid system, where everything is north, south, east, or west, such as Phoenix or Tucson (check out maps for these cities, you'll see what I am talking about), the whole NSEW things is far easier than if you are from some place that just has a lot of windy roads going in a lot of different directions. Hell, I know without question that I know my compass directions far more when I am in Phoenix than when I am in, say, New Jersey.

And here, you reach the Westbank (of the River) by going South along I-10 East...

To get to Tucson from Phoenix, you take I-10 East. But you drive south.
To get to Phoenix from Tucson, you take I-10 West....driving north.
It's a little bend in I-10 that causes the road, for 110 miles between the two cities, to basically lie to you about directions.

Poster on this board are automatically idiot-proof.

I respectfully disagree. This board is no different from any other group. We have our geniuses and our idiots.

We are just more polite about not pointing out the idiots.

Other than when I point out the fact that I myself am an idiot. Which I do rather frequently, as it's both very amusing and very true.

I always like to say: "In Britain, we drive on the correct sde of the road."

And I like to say I'm boinking Megan Fox.

Sadly for the you and I, neither statement is true.

[BookstoreEscapee]

And sinister stuff with the left hand, rig^H^H^Hcorrect?

Who, me? Never.

[Chromatix]

I always like to say: "In Britain, we drive on the correct sde of the road."

[Shalom]

I just naturally do anything that requires any dexterity with my right hand.

And sinister stuff with the left hand, rig^H^H^Hcorrect?

[BookstoreEscapee]

and when giving directions, even over the phone, i will gesture with my hands towards the direction of the turn, and i'll make the gesture several times before i actually commit to "right" or "left" - i even turn around, so that i'm facing the direction i'm telling them to come from...*usually only for on the phone*

I do that, too. I have to picture which way they're coming from. I can't do NSEW, either. The highways are generally known by their number/direction, so if I get on the highway I know I'm on 9 North, or 36 East (which also runs N/S in some spots), or whatever, but if I'm on a regular named street I couldn't tell you what direction I was going, unless I'm close enough to such a highway to be able to compare directions.

Left and right I've never had a problem with, though. I am so not left handed it'd be hard for me to forget which is which. I just naturally do anything that requires any dexterity with my right hand.

[Shalom]

There's a place in Northern NJ where you are simultaneously on 15 South and 94 North for a few blocks.

(edit: I just checked the Google street view, and they've blurred out the lower half of the sign showing 15 South. Has to be deliberate. If you back up one click, you can see both signs. It's at 4 Lafayette Rd, 07848 if anyone's curious.)

back when i was in the navy ... if someone was going to the left instead of the right we'd say "no, your other right". heh

My grandmother was born in Hungary. She was a lefty. Whenever she'd pick up a pen with her left hand in school they'd smack her with a ruler. For the rest of her life she got her lefts and her rights confused.

At her citizenship hearing, the judge said "Raise your right hand." She raised her left hand. Judge says "No, your other right hand..."

[Exaspera]

No worries. Poster on this board are automatically idiot-proof. The bbs software would not have allowed to register if you were a Carrier of the I-Dee-Ten-Tee virus.

But I am staying with this one.

[LadyAndreca]

I casually ask her what her e-mail address is--I knew it. @aol.com. All of them are. Idiots.

I read that as "women who have this problem are afraid to use anything but AOL and are idiots", not "all AOL uses are idiots". Why'd everyone get so worked up all of a sudden? O_o

My father-in-law is one of those types who refuses to use a computer. He's in his 70s and never used a computer in his life and just refuses to even try to learn. His wife is a few years younger and a teacher and learned to adapt to e-mail and writing documents on the computer, but is otherwise afraid to touch anything on the computer. Anytime the computer does anything the LEAST bit funny, or she has to upload school photos online or make a presentation, she makes hubby or his brother come over and do it for her.

Of course, not all old people are like that--my grandfather (pushing 80 himself) could run circles around me with computers if he cared to!

[Exaspera]

Great, I'm over 50, in the South and use AOL. 3 for 3.

[EricKei]

Really? I think I'll have to ask around later to see if I'm an idiot.

No worries. Poster on this board are automatically idiot-proof. The bbs software would not have allowed to register if you were a Carrier of the I-Dee-Ten-Tee virus.

[dalesys]

Really? I think I'll have to ask around later to see if I'm an idiot.

Umm... Erm... We still love you!

(At least *my* two brain cells do)